BOSTON (AP) - A justice with Massachusetts’ highest court ruled the state has failed in its duty to investigate the work of a chemist at a Boston laboratory whose flawed work led to the dismissal of thousands of convictions.
The Boston Globe reports Supreme Judicial Court Associate Justice Scott L. Kafker’s ruling on Thursday is the latest development in the case of former state chemist Sonja Farak who worked while high almost every day.
Farak was convicted in 2014 after pleading guilty to stealing drug evidence from the state lab in Amherst, where she worked after leaving a lab in Jamaica Plain.
A report filed in September with the court said more than 24,000 convictions in 16,449 cases have been dismissed as a result of the scandal.
The Middlesex district attorney’s office says it is reviewing Kafker’s decision.
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